Attention (on projects past, present, and future) is being paid to webcomickers, and that it all meet and proper.

• We’ve mentioned the ongoing series of geographically-themed fairy tale anthologies from Kel McDonald, Cautionary Fables and Fairy Tales, on more than one occasion. Volume three’s been out for a while now, and it’s gathering notice. Caitlin Rosenberg over at The AV Club does her usual thorough analysis and found parts of the Asia edition of CF&FT a mixed bag — while she finds the stories visually appealing, she finds their overall quality variable, and the book as a whole lacking in cohesion beyond “Asia”.

  I’d argue that what she’s describing is one of the defining characteristics of anthologies, which she acknowledges in noting the individual stories are good, but don’t seem to work together. I’ve read the two prior CF&FT editions, and never found that awkwardness to be an issue, but I also approach anthologies as a book that I revisit time and again, consuming small chunks in isolation rather than reading through. I’ll pick it up at some point in the future, if only to read a new Monkey King story from Gene Luen Yang and to find creators I wasn’t familiar with before.

  And when you’re done reading Rosenberg’s review, check out Tim O’Neil’s take on the last few months of Achewood; O’Neil’s a critic I find myself disagreeing with more than agreeing, but he holds forth on the weirdness and melancholy of Achewood to a masturbatory degree that I not only appreciate, but find as obsessive as my own writings on the topic. I don’t want to get all article on you, but Achewood is definitely something you should be paying attention to.

• In my hold box at my local comic shop today: issue #2 of Goldie Vance by the inimitable Hope Larson (words) and Brittney Williams (pictures). Issue #1 did a great job of capturing a moment in the early Space Age, finding a niche where a whole host of non-white people could represent all strata of society, and wrapped the whole thing up in a Nancy Drewesque mystery motif.

  Comes now the news (which I first noticed from Johanna Draper Carlson) that GV is no longer a four-issue miniseries but an ongoing title. Based on that first issue (and presumably, those making the decisions have seen the full four issues), this was a no-brainer of a decision. It’s a terrific book.

  It’s been mentioned more than once that GV publisher BOOM! is crappy with the page rates, so one can only hope (no pun intended) that by tapping one of the best known and successful creators of her generation, Larson had the leverage to explain that she does not value things like building your career and great exposure. If BOOM! is able to maintain profits on Goldie Vance, they’ll have no excuse to plead poverty in underpaying so many other of their writers and artists.

• First it was Christopher Hastings, tapped for one-shots and minis before landing Gwenpool, then Ryan North, tasked to make Squirrel Girl the surprise breakout hit of the past year. It appears that Marvel’s learned that if you need a more light-hearted — one might even say comical — comic book in a world of capes that are overly serious, you tap a longtime webcomicker.

  Latest proof: a tie-in book (due in August) to the latest no-really-this-will-change-everything line-wide crossover will feature the writing of one John Allison, whose work is the diametric opposite of grimdark.

  Judging from the description, it appears that Allison will be contributing a story about the Marvel Universe’s most blusteringly beleaguered newspaperman¹, which ought to allow for plenty of room for a story that flirts with humo[u]r². So well done, Mr Allison, and damn you for making me buy a damn line-wide event tie-in book … that’s how they get you.

• Rosemary Valero-O’Connell has shared a bit more of her next book³ — the centerspread this time. Do yourself a favor, set aside a buck or two each month, so that you’ll be ready to purchase the moment it releases. Given the polish it’s got with at least a year and a half to go until release, I’m willing to say entirely on faith that it’s going to be great.

Spam of the day:

Poster & Release Date Announced: #TravelBoobs

It claims to be a forthcoming YouTube series, but I’m not clicking on anything in this email to find out.

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¹ Want to stop feeling like the entire world is arrayed against you, Jameson? Maybe don’t wear a friggin’ Hitler moustache.

² Dare I say, whimsy?

³ Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me, words by Mariko Tamaki, coming from :01 Books in 2018 (whimper).

When I first checked social media this morning I was surprised when Twitter told me I had 456 unread tweets; usually an overnight is good for fewer than 200, given the number of people I follow and their sleep patterns. 250 would be a lot for one night, above that indicates something stupid happening in a Republican presidential debate that I didn’t stay up for or somebody influential kicking it.

This time, however, it was down to one person — and if you’re gonna do a serious tweetstorm, this is the one to do. [C] Spike [Trotman] has been on top of the Rat Queens brouhaha¹ and last night during her typical small hours worktime decided on a course of action:

In light of Rat Queens disappointing everybody: Women/NB creators, tweet me w/links to your cool comics starring tuff gals. I’ll RT.

There was an immediate flood of responses and Spike made with the retweets, blowing up my timelines, pausing for a while to catch some sleep before resuming some hours later. I’d be hard pressed to estimate how many creators she retweeted, but I’d say probably in the vicinity of 200-300 before giving it a rest about eight hours later. Best of all? I recognized a mere handful of the comics that got the RT treatment (and by that I mean literally five), so there’s a lot of new comics to check out.

Probably most of them aren’t great, because most of everything isn’t great. But I’ll betcha there’s 20 to 50 in that grouping that damn good to excellent, just waiting for anybody that’s got the time to start collecting links. Anybody that’s really enterprising could Storify the list; do it for the children.

In other news:

• My evil twin announced pre-orders on his next book open on Monday along with a deadline to provide shipping info for this last Kickstarter and another deadline to register for the chance to take a tropical cruise with him. If you can think of something better to do for a week in September than spend it on a ship with my evil twin, sipping on fruity drinks and learning about writing, I don’t know what it is.
• Speaking of Kickstarts, Dante Shepherd² announced that he’s doing another page-a-day calendar for 2017, seeing as how the 2014 one was a success³. Kickstarter went up a couple hours ago, with the able help of TopatoCo and Make That Thing.
• Heh, when I went by the MTT page to check on Shepherd’s calendar, it told me that Jess Fink’s second Chester 5000 collection will finish its funding round in 69 hours. Yes, I am perpetually twelve years old.
• Finally, KC Green and Anthony Clark are making the best weekly-updating comic publishing today (BACK) and they are not the sort to screw around with pre-orders or crowdfunding. No! They are men of action and when they want to print a collection of their work they by Glob go out and print it and and pay John Keogh and Britt Wilson for enhancements to the book and then they sell it, financial risks be damned. As a result, you can now purchase a copy of BACK Book 1 from the web’s finest boutiquery so go do that.

Spam of the day:

Stunning waterfront property in Michigan’s majestic Upper Peninsula
Private setting with convenient location to ATV / snowmobile trails.

Translation: no roads, no utilities, you will die out here alone. Also, for a significant portion of the year, the Upper Peninsula is cold as fuck.

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¹ Long story short — a comic about female empowerment had its original artist yanked from the book after a domestic violence arrest; other artists have since filled in. A hiatus announcement led to the current artist indicating she was removed from the book in favor of the original guy returning — meaning an abusive husband would again be drawing a book about women that don’t put up with shit, yikes.

On a personal note, literally two days before the news broke I picked up Rat Queens trade paperback one on the recommendation of my niece and loved it, having been unaware of the unsavory reputation of the original artist, and was planing on purchasing the second and third collections but now I’m not sure.

² Who is his own evil twin, or at least his own dark reflection. Which one is more like Batman?

³ He was kind enough to send me one — it took up so much space on my desk. This is not a tiny page-a-day, it has heft and also terrible jokes.

I mean, really critical systems that you need to do your job? I’m at four and counting!

So here something I was going to talk about in much more detail today; it made the rounds end of last week but some people have still not seen it. From Gigi DG (of the incomparable Cucumber Quest) comes the webcomics equivalent of a novella, Lady of the Shard. It’s an exercise in emotion, a demonstration of depth, and an experimental technology that can make somebody cut onions in the next room through a computer, all done with an absolute minimum of words and lines.

I once asked in reference to a C&D that Rich Stevens got from Lucasfilm over a t-shirt that had a pixel representation of a TIE Fighter (which was about this detailed: (-O-) ) how few pixels you can use to represent a thing before you lose the identity of that thing; in the case of Stevens’s t-shirt, the answer was somewhat less than 24, which if memory serves was the number of squares in the design.

Ms DG isn’t quite that spare in her art for LotS, but she’s not far off. Whole galactic societies (and the hearts of one young acolyte and two immensely ancient goddesses) are rendered in pixelly low-res white and grey (and the occasional, angry red) against a stark, midnight, starless background.

None of the vibrant colors and swoopy curves that she’s known for — LotS has a scratchy, nervous energy that is a masterpiece of the comics form; if this is what she’s been working on while guest strips have been running at CQ, since mid-March, it’s a break well spent. Set aside half an hour and read through Lady of the Shard; then set aside an hour and read it again, taking in all the details and things said (but unsaid) in the space between all those pixels.

Edit to add: new Perry Bible Fellowship, for everybody that loves sound effects that are extra … effecty.

Spam of the day:

Want Stamina, Virility and Add Inches in all the “right” places?

Of course! I want to purchase all of the euphemisms from the Purple Rhino company, that is a thing that completely makes sense.

… and I’m going to have to drive through it up ol’ I-95¹. Let’s make this brief.

Over the past three months, the full run of previously-published Octopus Pie (by Meredith Gran, who remains Best At Comics) has been republished by Image in three handsome volumes; in a little less than two weeks time, the fourth book in the series — never before published material! color! — will hit the shops and Gran’s having an event to celebrate:

I’m hosting a pop-up event for the release of my new book, Octopus Pie Volume 4!

This is the first time in years that brand new OP material has been in print, and I’m damn proud of this book and hope you would like a copy! They will be for sale at the event, in addition to Volumes 1-3, a bit of TBA merch, and original comic art on the walls!

That’ll be on Wednesday, 25 May (release day!) at Creations Gallery, 89 Avenue C (corner of East 6th) in Manhattan, from 6:00pm to 9:00pm. You can RSVP at the Facebook event page (which I would do except I’m not on Facebook — Mer, barring disaster I’ll totally be there), and come enjoy some Good Times.

And a few days after, Octopus Pie will be considered for the Online Comics — Long Form division award from the NCS at the Reubens weekend in Nashville; Gran’s got some formidable opposition in her category, but I think with some luck and gumption, she’ll wake up the following day a Broadway star!

I may have gotten a little ahead of myself there, but for reals — tell your local comic shop you want a copy of Octopie 4 because it’s full of great comics.

Spam of the day:

Hi my name is Emily and I just wanted to send you a quick note here instead of calling you.

Who the hell are you and how did you get my number.

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¹ If I don’t make it, tell KB Spangler that I died in battle with her nemesis.

We’re pretty much at deadline if you still want to head to Toronto and the attendant Comics Art Festival therein. Part of what showrunner Chris Butcher’s put together that’s always impressed the hell out of me is how much the city of Toronto is involved in TCAF, and how many events happen around the Fest. In case you’ve been wondering how broad TCAF is, check out the list of associated events.

Exhibitions launched 12 days ago, discussions and salons are taking place, artistic meetups have met up (some with sophisticated adult beverages), gallery shows are opening, academics are convening, book launches are happening, international receptions will celebrate the creators of multiple countries, celebrations of previously-marginalized people, concerts, awards, and a plain ol’ party or two.

Plus comics. You know, for kids.

Oh, and a world’s worth of the best guests and exhibitors mixing it up on five different programming tracks plus (for the first time) portfolio reviews. Everything and everybody significant in comics is converging on Toronto except for the otherwise-ubiquitous Jim Zub who is presently busy gettin’ drunk in Japan¹.

So to whatever degree it is practical for you to do so, get up to The Big Smoke², get you some comics, and if you see Chris Butcher thank him for all the work he does year ’round to make TCAF the best show for its size in the world.

PS: Yuko is going to be there and she is totally going to have an 18+ Stucky minicomic that she and Jess Fink did together and that is the best thing ever.

PPS: I forget how many days it’s been since I mentioned that Meredith Gran last achieved a New Best Octopus Pie Strip, but in any event the clock has been reset to one day and counting. Holy crap, so much story, so much emotion, and the best representation of inner mental state all packed into one image. Eve’s lizard brain is my new hero.

Spam of the day:

Don’t-Take a Cruise! Rent a Yacht! All Budgets & Sizes Available

You have radically overestimated the degree to which I wish to take a cruise, and my recreation budget. I guess thanks for the second half?

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¹ I’m so envious about the stop he and his lovely bride made at Ikebukuro’s owl cafe.

² Southern Ontario version.

I refer, naturally, to this Diesel Sweeties strip from a week or so ago; I’m sure anybody that’s watched the last few iterations of Trek intuitively knows what the punchline is¹, I’m just surprised that Rich Stevens didn’t render it in plqaD script, but if you want to read Maura’s line in the original you can do so here.

Yes, that entire thing amused me enough to mention it after my time away. Deal.

In other news:

• TopatoCon 2 (The TopatoConenning? Electric TopatoLoo?) exhibitor and volunteer applications have been up for a while now, and although the show is still five months away, the first cluster of guests has been announced:
  

  Topatocon would like to welcome special guests @ryanqnorth @badmachinery @SarahCAndersen and @hollyblack !!!

  The Toronto Man-Mountain needs no introduction; John Allison appears on this side of the Atlantic about once in forever; Sarah Andersen’s got a first book is out now, and Holly Black is both a hell of a YA author and a mean cocktail-mixer².

• Okay, I lied — said Man-Mountain does need an introduction, as it was announced yesterday that Ryan North is now — in addition to his scripting duties on The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl for Marvel — taking over writing duties on Jughead from Chip Zdarsky with issue #9. At the same time, his Squirrel Girl art partner, Erica Henderson will be turning over the Jughead art duties to Derek Charm. Quite a comic book authoring resume our Mr North is building.

  Oh, and if you weren’t smart enough to back North’s first pickable-path Shakespeare book, you might not have noticed that he’s live-playing through the start of his next pickable-path Shakespeare book in the updates of the Kickstart for the last one. So far we’ve determined that Juliet is ripped and is very possibly curious about rooster testicles! Romeo and/or Juliet drops in just about a month on 7 June.

• So I told you I was going to be keeping an eye on Rosemary Valero-O’Connell last month; she’s not disappointed in the weeks since with the work she’s either announced or shared with us. That streak kept up yesterday, letting us see part of her senior thesis³:
  

  The prologue pages of Black Sun Rising, my senior thesis, are now available to read! http://livertaker.tumblr.com/post/144164545963/a-preview-of-the-first-chapter-of-black-sun …

  It’s gorgeous, it does a bang-up job setting mood and expectations (with more than a bit of Emily Carrollesque dread), and makes me want to read far more than these four pages. Rosemary — however long this comic is, find a way to print it in a handsome presentation, mark it up about four times, and sell it to me (and all other right-thinking folk). There is no mathematical possibility that the rest of this story isn’t excellent.

Spam of the day:

Cadence Williams (Google Team) sent you a message:

You know, the fact that you sent me this spam at Google’s own email service but that it doesn’t have a Google return address? Makes me a mite suspicious.

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¹ If not, you can type Heghlu’meH QaQ jajvam into the Bing Translator (but it doesn’t autodectect tlhIngan Hol).
http://yellowantphil.com/pIqaD_converter.php

² Assuming we do a drinks competition again this year like last year, I’d want Black, the reigning 86d! champion, to either take a judging role, or join me in hosting/commenting duties.

³ Yep, she’s just now graduating college and this makes her less than half my age and already so very skilled. She’s only going to get better.

AHHHHHHHH:

Oh hey, what? The Abominable Charles Christopher is back.

This is no minor AHHHHHHHH, this is the AHHHHHHHH from deep in your soul, best accompanied by the declaration I’M A SHARK. Karl Kerschl is between projects, Charles Christopher is back, and all is well in the world again.

Oh, yeah, other stuff is going on, too. Like TCAF later this week, which almost everybody in webcomics attends in alternating years¹. And that event reminds me that Fleen Senior French Correspondent Pierre Lebeaupin noticed that the French contingent at TCAF will be more than just Featured Guest Boulet (who, don’t get me wrong, is great):

Yves Bigerel, better known as Balak, renowned inventor of turbomédia (remember about digital comics? He has kept making this stuff ever since) and of the jambon-beurre-based method of drawing the chonchon [NSFW], who, with Bastien Vivès, will be there for Last Man.

Marguerite Abouet, writer of the fantastic Aya of Yop City and Akissi.

Somehow I missed the announcement of Balak and Vivès, and I don’t know Abouet’s work at all, so be smarter than me and seek them out. Also, that video of Balak? Somebody make sure that Rokudenashiko sees it, since it’s right up her alley². I don’t know if the split verdict on Rokudenashiko’s obscenity trial³ would cause some overzealous prig at Canadian Immigration to keep her out of the country, but here’s hoping it doesn’t happen.

PS: AHHHHHHHH.

Spam of the day:

Checkout the latest Cleaning Service Options
Checkout the latest Used Cars
Checkout the latest Varicose Vein Treatment
Checkout the latest CPAP Options

Four spams, one return address. So I’m an elderly person with bad legs, sleep apnea, a dirty house, and a need to hit the open road? Got it.

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¹ TCAF being so popular with vendors and space not being infinite, a couple of years ago showrunner Chris Butcher instituted an every-other-year plan for exhibitors. Some individuals are there more often if they get hosted by, say, a publisher like TopatoCo or Koyama Press.

² So to speak.

³ She was acquitted on charges of displaying plaster casts of her vulva as art, but convicted of distributing 3D printer data files that would allow others to create the same sculptures. The latter hit her with a ¥400,000 (approximately US$4000) fine, which she is appealing.

As for the immigration issue, the customs and immigration folks have long had a bug up their respective butts about what they consider obscenity, especially as regards comics and manga. If anybody traveling to TCAF will invoke their ire, it’ll be Rokudenashiko. On the plus side, if there’s no problems with getting to the show, she can trade kayak stories with Karla Pacheco.

I was going to spend today’s post catching up on all the things that happened during my recent and unfortunate hiatus, but you people keep doing things. So I’m not able to spend a proper amount of time on KC Green’s moment of historiography, Abby Howard’s The Last Halloween Kickstart (back it, dammit, I want my book), Magnolia Porter, Aatmaja Pandya, and Victoria Elliott’s visual novel, the now-open submissions at Creators for Creators, or news from Fleen Senior French Correspondent Pierre Lebeaupin¹. What could be so important as to displace all that awesomeness?

• Oh, I don’t know, how about Oni Press announcing a whole new imprint to be dedicated to erotic and sex education comics?
  

  Oni Press, Portland’s premier independent comic book publisher, is proud to announce Limerence Press, a new erotic and sex education comics imprint focused on positive, diverse, and approachable stories that reflect a wide variety of emotional and intimate experiences.

  Okay, one: great name. And two: sex education comics? Where on earth will they find creators to do serious but sexy education for … oh, right:

  Limerence Press is launching with printed editions of volumes 1–3 of Oh Joy Sex Toy, a popular sex education and sex toy review webcomic by creators by Erika Moen and Matthew Nolan.

  To say that this is a perfect match would be an understatement; to say that Moen is excited about it would be be entirely truthful, but lacking in sufficient emphasis. Best of all, this is going to open up avenues that Nolan & Moen have not had for distribution previously:

  Limerence Press is printing Moen and Nolan’s Oh Joy Sex Toy Volume 3 Kickstarter books, helping the creative team reduce costs. The unique and limited-Kickstarter edition cover will be exclusive to Kickstarter backers, and serve as the books that Moen and Nolan sell directly online, at conventions, and at book signings. A separate Limerence Press cover will be distributed to comic shop retailers, bookstores, and specialty shops—avenues previously inaccessible to the creators.

  The Kickstart + regular edition is something Oni have experience with, having previously used the model on Yuko Ota & Ananth Hirsh’s Lucky Penny (which they’ve been taking awards nominations for since I’ve been gone). And sharp-eyed readers will note that Limerence is launching with three volumes of OJST, and yet there have only been two print collections to date — which brings us to the third part of the news:

  Which leads me to my NEXT announcement (oh yes, there’s more!)… The Volume 3 Kickstarter will be launching at 11am PST today!!!!

  Or about 20 minutes from now as I type this line. Congratulations to Moen, Nolan, Oni, and everybody involved with Limerence — but most of all congrats to all the people who haven’t seen OJST before and will now have the opportunity to get factual, healthful, utterly necessary information. There’s way too many people — kids, really — who don’t get anything resembling true information about sexuality, and for whom sex education equates to Don’t do it before you get married or God will blow your legs off, a situation that leads to increased rates of unintended pregnancy and STI transmission. Moen, Nolan, et. al. are serving the public good, and more power to ’em.

• Also coincidentally launching today: Matt Lubchansky (whose Dad Magazine, with wife Jaya Saxena, has launched to great acclaim and is outselling Hamilton for goodness sake) has Kickstarted the first collection of his Please Listen To Me comics and is more than 50% of the way to goal a little less than 14 hours in. Lubchansky’s one of the best gag cartoonists (that is, not using set cast members; he doesn’t limit himself to the single panel gag format) working today, and this book is going to both have excellent cartoons and make the right people cry. Go get it.

Spam of the day:

Secret so powerful it was kept out of The Bible! Click here to read Jesus’ lost words and how they could improve your life!

Let me guess: Drink more Ovaltine?

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¹ Actually, FSFCPL’s news is not time-sensitive, so we’ll get to that one in a day or so.

Not quite back, but soon. Thanks for all of your support in what continues to be a challenging time. I also wanted to duck my head back in because if life had not interfered, I would have been running a review of Lucy Knisley’s Something New, which releases today. Short version then: it’s terrific (expectedly so, since it’s Knisley), and the entire book felt more real than real for me.

This is probably because even though I didn’t know it at the time, the story makes it clear that I know people who were at wedding that is the climax of the book¹; autobio has always felt a bit distant to me, learning what it’s like inside the life of somebody else who is not me and to whom I have only the connection of this story.

But being only a degree of separation away from the action, it becomes less life as story (which my brain is trained to read as fiction) and more a case of Did I tell you what happened at Lucy’s wedding? OMG it was so great which is immediately real. It doesn’t hurt that Knisley is such a personable presence, it’s like she’s telling somebody else the story about how what you did at her wedding was OMG so great. In conclusion, Lucy Knisley’s life journey keeps getting more interesting² and you should join her on it.

Spam of the day:

Pocket-Sized Wallet Holds 3 Dozen Cards, IDs, Money and More!

Part of what it holds is a malware warning for the advertised site. Anyway, I’ve already found the perfect low-profile wallet so eat it, spammers.

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¹ Spoiler alert: they did.

² And given that her shop shows all shipments on hold for maternity leave, it’s going to be more so soon.

Welma Rebecca Pierce died peacefully this morning with her husband of 62 years, Bill, by her side. She was my wife’s mother, as sweet a lady as I’ve ever known, and I will miss her.

I’ll be gone for some time; play nice and be good to each other until I’m back.